Alan Pardew has told Newcastle United fans that they are in for a treat when they see Emmanuel Rivière in full flow.

The French striker will make his debut against Manchester City and is going to lead the line for his new team at St James’ Park.

The calls for one more striker have not diminished and the £6m signing of Rivière from Monaco was, at the time, not seen as any kind of marquee signing.

However, the 24-year-old had a superb pre-season. He was sharp, skillful and scored some goals.

Now he has to do it for real and Pardew believes he has a gem on his hands.

The United boss said: “I think he’s a player that was stuck at Monaco behind some unbelievable footballers. All he could do was come on to the pitch and score if he got the chance, and he did that, so he didn’t do too much wrong there.

“We’re fortunate to have him and we think he’s a player who can grow. I like his attitude and he’s hungry. He’s a different type of player to Papiss Cisse.

“I just hope everything falls for him. I have been fairly successful here with strikers and hopefully he will be a success too. Manu is a little bit ahead of Facundo Ferreyra at the moment.”

Pardew has a big decision to make regarding Rolando Aarons.

The 18-year-old has been the pick of all the Newcastle players over the summer and with Yoan Gouffran thought to not be 100 per cent fit, Aarons may get a start against the champions.

Pardew said: “We have produced one of our own in Rolando and he’s really excelled in pre-season.

“Our fans will love him, but we have to be careful we don’t push him too soon. He’s been a bonus.

It does seem that with two weeks of the transfer window still to go, there is room for Newcastle to do more business.

But it may be the case of one has to go out before one comes in.

Pardew was asked whether the players who are not currently in his plans, Hatem Ben Arfa being the most obvious, would be definitely leaving the club.

He said: “Maybe, maybe not. It depends. I think the balance of the squad is always important, the spirit is crucial and when you seen teams that win trophies, it’s obvious you need a group of players who not only have the quality and physical prowess, and more importantly, have the spirit because you can see great teams who fail when they don’t have that.

“Look at Spain in their World Cup and France after they won in 1998. You need that spirit and I think we have a great spirit this summer.

“I will not allow anything to alter that spirit and I will ensure it remains as it is.

“So where do I stop and start with that? At the moment, we’ve a group and they’re all Newcastle players at the moment. There’s no one imminently coming into this building. We’ve got a good group and I’m getting on with that.

“In the transfer market, we have to stay on our toes and always be alert to the possibility of a quality player becoming available, but it would have to fit into our financial structure.

“We’ve done well in the market, but we still have to keep our eyes on it.”

It will be interesting to see what formation Pardew goes with in this first Premier League match.

He has tinkered with a 4-4-1-1 and 4-2-3-1 and Pardew believes he has the players who can cope with changing systems depending on the situation.

Pardew said: “We’ll be able to change our system easily this year, which is something you need to be able to do. You can’t compete against the top teams with one simple system.

“You’ve got to change and try to throw equations at them that they’re not expecting – we’ve got the players to do that.